Today, many different kinds of audio equipment, audio cables and connectors are utilized for various applications. In most of these situations, the user is seeking to transmit high quality sounds. Along with improved sound quality, many users would also like to minimize distortion in audio cables, minimize phase distortion and eliminate skin effect. Skin effect causes electricity to be concentrated at the surface of a wire with decreasing concentration of energy in the wire as the distance from the surface increases. In particular, signal transmission requirements have become higher because of the greater fidelity and sensitivity of currently available audio system equipment. This is especially true in audio speaker equipment.
However, the signal cables now utilized to convey alphanumeric pulse or audio frequency provide alternating current signals involving transmission principles that are much more complex than that of direct current transmission. In addition to the resistance encountered by electricity flowing through cables and connectors and the generation of magnetic fields, there is skin effect occurring between high and low frequencies as well as phase distortion. Skin effect is a phenomenon that causes electricity to be concentrated at the surface of a conductor with decreasing concentration of energy in the conductor as the distance from the surface increases. The concentration is for the most part uniform. However, when multiple electrical strands or wires are positioned near each other, strand interaction can cause a shift in where the center is located to a point closer to the other strands thereby decreasing the amount of power the cable can handle. It is known that a group of wires or strands behaves similarly to a single wire in that it has a higher concentration of energy near the surface and a lower concentration towards the center with each wire transferring a higher concentration of its energy near its surface and less towards its center.
In order to transmit a signal via an audio cable and connector at a balanced and totally true fidelity, at acoustic frequency ranges of 20 Hz to 20 kHz or wider, one must painstakingly design and match up an audio cable with a connector. By so doing, one can be assured that an amplified signal sounds similar to the original recording.
The design of a connector and its ability to interface with the multiple electrical wires or strands in an audio speaker cable is very important to obtaining transmission of high quality audio sounds.
Now an improved connector has been invented which has a unique securement configuration to allow a plurality of wires in an audio cable to be secured in a fashion that increases sound quality, minimizes distortion and eliminates skin effect. A combination connector and audio cable has also been invented, as well as a method of securing the connector to the audio cable.